


lucky strikes

by jerry_seinfeld



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Angst, M/M, aesthetic?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-01
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-27 18:12:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12587696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jerry_seinfeld/pseuds/jerry_seinfeld
Summary: the only reason baekhyun still smokes is because it tastes like chanyeol.ortwo past lovers meet up to talk about what happens next





	lucky strikes

**Author's Note:**

> im back!!! <3

the wind is cold and freckles chanyeol’s face with pin-needle rain drops. the skies are gray and baekhyun has an angry look in his eyes, almost as angry as the red ash that burns between his fingers. 

the next few moments pass with either of them ignoring the others existence, a disassociation that comes with years of practice.

“why do you still smoke?” chanyeol finally says, his voice low, cautious. yet, he still refuses to truly acknowledge him. to admit that he’s here, and he’s real, and all chanyeol has to do is just reach out, and there he’ll be.

baekhyun flicks his cigarette. the sparks fall to his feet. a few land on the tip of chanyeol’s shoe. “you know why.”

“i don’t, actually.”

“whatever. doesn’t matter. i still do it.”

chanyeol shoves his hands deeper in the pockets of his jacket, curling his fists around themselves. there’s a pause as baekhyun takes another long drag. he tilts his head up to the sky and relaxes his chest, white smoke curling out from his lips.

chanyeol looks away for a moment. the smell reminds him too much of a younger baekhyun, a younger chanyeol. stupider, too. “what do you want?”

baekhyun shrugs, “there were feelings involved in the reason i called you. and i don’t want to talk about them.”

“well, you at least have to explain to me why i’m here.”

“do i?” baekhyun inhales the last bit before flicking the butte to the ground and smothering it with his sneaker. “remember the drive we took to montana? when you couldn’t imagine what it looked like?”

“yeah, i do.”

“i can’t believe we drove twelve hours just because you couldn’t look up pictures of some damn mountains.” chanyeol almost laughs. he feels it rise to his lips, but he keeps his face straight. he envies baekhyun’s cover of emotional stability as the other eyes him while he clears his throat. 

“wasn’t that where we-“ chanyeol catches himself.

“it was, yeah.”

“so it wasn’t entirely pointless.”

“i never said it was pointless. it wasn’t. just…extravagant.”

“i learned a lot about you on that trip.” chanyeol rests the left side of his body against the chainlink fence baekhyun leans back on. he glances below, to the road below that crosses the bridge they’re on. “like how you have an obsession with the mini boxes of cereal they sell at four dollars for twelve.”

“still do. that was a fucking ripoff, by the way. if each box is one ounce, thats twenty of the mini ones in one full box. and you can get full boxes for three dollars. it’s an outrage.”

“and how you oddly have a strong opinion about everything,” baekhyun smiles for a second, so quickly, chanyeol doesn’t catch it at first. until he’s replaying that second in his mind.

chanyeol runs a hand through his hair, shedding the drops of rain that gathered there. “tell me why you smoke.”

“no.”

“it’s not a big deal, just tell me.”

“no.”

“c’mon.”

“because they taste like you did.”

the breath leaves chanyeol’s body and his brain goes blank. “…what?”

“they remind me of you. of us. you always smoked lucky strikes, cause they were only two dollars at that convenience store by the apartment.” 

lucky strikes. he can still remember the musky scent they gave off. not from the brand itself, but from being stuffed in the store owner’s back room for so long, until chanyeol was finally the only one who bought them. two packs a week. he smoked like a freight train.

chanyeol’s - unwillingly - reminded of hours spent sitting on his and baekhyun’s flea-market couch, watching the spanish channels because that’s the only ones they could get, chanyeol smoking his lucky strikes, and baekhyun drinking a beer. 

sometimes they’d make out, sometimes they’d have sex, but mostly it was just the two of them, chanyeol laying long-ways on the couch, his legs stretched over the other side, and baekhyun laying comfortably on top of him, his head resting on the giant’s chest. 

when they kissed, it always tasted like keystone beer and chanyeol’s lucky strikes. that’s why chanyeol gave up smoking. he’d probably throw up if he ever tasted one again. 

“is that why you called? because you…missed me or something?”

baekhyun glances down. serious talks were never his strong suit. “yeah. i…i miss you.”

 

the happy memories fade as suddenly as they came, replaced with ones of goodbye notes and heavy sobbing and nails digging into the skin of chanyeol’s arms.

he depended his whole life on baekhyun, and shoved everyone else who mattered aside like they meant nothing to him. and when baekhyun was gone, chanyeol had no one. absolutely no one. 

he wonders if baekhyun knows what it’s like to give everything to another person. to give so much that you can’t give anymore, and when you get nothing in return, you’re left to live on the ghost of yourself.

his and baekhyun’s relationship was special. it was beautiful, and full of mistakes, but still perfect. chanyeol loved like he had nothing to lose. he was so blinded by his own love he couldn’t see that baekhyun didn’t feel the same.

until one day baekhyun opened chanyeol’s eyes. by emptying his side of the closet, closing the front door, and never opening it again.

“why? are you afraid no one will ever love you like i did?” he says the words so nonchalantly, because he’s never had the chance to truly end this relationship, and he really doesn’t want to fuck it up.

“i…”

“part of me just wants to find the right words to hurt you like you hurt me. but…i know that’s impossible,” chanyeol gives a dry laugh, dizzy with saying the words aloud. “because you never cared enough to hurt for me.”

a pause. baekhyun keeps his head down. tears gather on the rims of chanyeol’s eyes. “i’m trying so hard right now…to remember what it was like to love you. i can’t feel it, though. it’s just…gone. like it was never there. like you were never there. and i’m happier this way. i know it’s toxic or whatever, but forgetting you…makes it easier.”

chanyeol smiles. for once, he actually smiles. “enjoy your lucky strikes…if they’re what helps.”

for his own sake, chanyeol doesn’t look back. he doesn’t want to have a memory of the last time he saw baekhyun’s face. it’s funny, he remembers regretting the same thing when baekhyun left. he always thought to himself, why didn’t he take one last look? appreciate everything about him for one last time?

chanyeol is finally rid of the feeling of being indebted to byun baekhyun.

**Author's Note:**

> thank u for reading!!! pls leave a comment, i love hearing for you guys <33
> 
> (shameless(ful) self-promo) pls check out my other fics? id really appreciate it <3


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